In the stars, the alicorns were gathering.
Sisters, come! In the heart of Virgo, we sing the thousand-year death-song for a fading galaxy. We shall gather its embers and bank them in the black hole at its core.
“And then we come to the water service fee,” Dotted Line said, turning another page.
Celestia blinked away the image of her sisters glowing like flames against an infinite velvet blackness. The Cabinet Secretary’s office seemed, by comparison, a sketch in gray pencil. The stack of neatly-lettered reports and ordinances managed to smell musty despite having all been written in the past two weeks.
“Very controversial,” the Secretary continued. “We charge per acre, as you know. Last year in Appleloosa, Flinthide Hayseed planted three acres of tomatoes.”
Celestia nodded. “Good Farmer Hayseed. He’s featured in several of your reports.”
We shall circle its fatal horizon and bathe in its death-glow. We will sing the song of making as we dive into its gravity well. We shall meet at its center and re-kindle its fires, and a new galaxy shall be born. Join us, Elder!
Dotted grunted discreetly. “Tomatoes, you see, use a lot of water. Not really suitable for an arid land like Appleloosa.”
Come, my lovely white dove. I remember when you danced the death of Eta Carinae, how your mane whipped in the solar wind as you hooves spread its heart across a hundred stars.
“The tomatoes all die, of course. Hayseed said he just wants to get his money’s worth.”
No mare’s laughter ever made the stars twinkle so brightly as yours did then!
“Flinthide Hayseed was never a very popular pony. I say that the way I would say a manticore isn’t a very popular dinner guest.” Dotted pulled a form from several pages further down and held it out for her inspection. “But the trouble really started when he filed for a drought relief reimbursement for his dead tomatoes.”
Hold in your brilliance no longer. Let me see your pelt glow like the furnace at the heart of Mu Cephei. Let me gaze into your eyes, lit with the light of a hundred suns, while I breathe down your neck from behind, and hold you tight while a thousand novas burst within us.
“Your Highness? Are you quite all right? We can do this later.”
Celestia shook her head, not so daintily as might be expected of a princess. “No,” she said, smiling. “I’m fine. Just a bit… distracted.” She took a deep breath. “Tell good Yeoman Hayseed that we will grant him a reimbursement for the expected value of his tomato crop, given the environmental conditions, if justified by a form SF-3553, Explanation of Peculiar Circumstances.”
Dotted inhaled sharply. “An SF-3553? Isn’t that a bit... drastic?”
Celestia nodded firmly. “Yes. Yes, it is.”
“I have faith, as always, in your judgement, Your Highness. But You help us if Flinthide turns out to be the pony who can actually finish the thing.” Dotted flipped the utility reports over onto the growing stack of finished items. He wrote a note, clipped it to Hayseed’s reimbursement application, and put that in a third pile. He cleared his throat. “Now. As regards the upcoming Gala. I have a petition here signed by seventy-three members of the nobility to find a ‘more secure’ location for this year’s festivities.”
Come drift with us. Remember all, then forget it, forget yourself, forget the borders between minds and drift, feel, see, be!
“Reassure them that we shall,” Celestia said with a slight smile.
“The only location more secure than the Royal Palace is the Royal Dungeons,” Dotted observed.
Celestia shrugged innocently.
Come! Fly between Rigel and Orion’s belt, out through the purest deep space. Pull up when you reach the great hydrogen clouds. You can be here in a hundred years!
Dotted clipped a note to the petition and put it in the third pile. “Now, my favorite: the recommendation committee’s annual report on the advisory committee’s annual report on the prior year’s activities of the recommendation committee.” He dropped a bound folio onto the desk before them with a bang. It was thicker than the Canterlot address directory.
Celestia’s shoulders sagged as she stretched her neck out towards the folio. Then she abruptly sat down on the floor behind the Cabinet Secretary’s desk and looked up at the ceiling.
When it became apparent this was not some momentary stretch or calisthenic maneuver, Dotted diplomatically pushed his chair out of the way, sat down beside her, and looked at another, nearby spot on the ceiling. It was probably overdue for inspection anyway. They sat there in silence while the light from the lantern flickered on the wall.
“Secretary Line,” Celestia said, “I would like a hug.”
Dotted blinked. “Your Highness?”
“A hug. I understand it is a thing ponies do.”
Dotted coughed. “Ponies, in general, yes.”
Celestia did not reply.
“Is that an order, Your Highness?”
“No.”
Dotted stood up and tiptoed around to face Celestia. He had spent much of his life one step away from Celestia, yet never touched her. It occurred to him for the first time that, as far as he knew--which was uncomfortably far, the precise location being contested daily between his senses of propriety and of national security--nopony else had, either.
He reached up and put his forelegs stiffly around Celestia’s shoulders, his eyes shut tight. Celestia inclined her neck until it brushed up against his, then reached up and pulled him against her, squeezing him in a grip like that of a Stalliongrad High Commissioner.
Dotted’s eyes opened in shock. Slowly, his face relaxed into a secret smile, and while the lamp light danced across tax forms and alicorns circled distant stars, the Princess of the Sun and her Cabinet Secretary gave each other an awkward yet perhaps not altogether unbearable hug.
The Princess let go, and Dotted slid back to the floor and took two steps back. He quickly coughed and turned back towards his desk, but before he reached it, she said, “Thank you, Dotted.”
Dotted mumbled incoherently.
Celestia laid a hoof on top of the thick report. “Before we return to the agenda, I want you to fill out a form GR-17, Recommendation for Recognition. Write, Action / Honor / Award: Pendant of the Sun. Recipient: Dotted Line. Then forward it to me for approval.”
Dotted pulled his eyebrows together. “The Pendant of the Sun is for heroism in the defense of Equestria.”
“It would have taken you less courage to lead a charge into battle,” she said, “and done less to defend Equestria. Hide it in your bottom desk drawer with the rest of your awards if you must, but you will accept it.”
She opened the report to its cover page. “Now. About these committees. What do they even do?”
Celestia leaned forward to inspect the report. Dotted grasped eagerly at the familiar bureaucratic miasma. Out past the constellations, the alicorns continued to gather.
Author's Note
This story takes place slightly before the return of Luna.
Dotted Line is from GhostOfHeraclitus' Equestrian Civil Service Series.
Now that you've read this story, you can read GhostOfHeraclitus' response, "Carbon, Hydrogen, Oxygen, Nitrogen".
